Excerpt from A Family Prayer Book and Private Manual: To Which Are Added Forms for Religious Societies and Schools; With a Collection of Hymns The Scriptures teach us to pray with tne understanding as well as with the spirit. I have endeavored therefore occasionally to suggest trains of religious thought, hoping thereby to touch the springs of devotion; yet, have carefully avoided those warlike disputes about doctrine, which so often rend in twain the seamless robe of Christ. It has been my first and ruling desire to write such prayers as the Saviour would approve. I have been anxious to take his own as my model, wishing to breathe into these forms the life-giving spirit of his gospel; so that the humble and pious worshipper may sanctify the Lord God in his heart, excite his devotional feelings, and, at the same time, cherish those christian truths and holy hopes which are of the highest value to man. I would now dedicate this manual to those for whom it was written; the old, the middle-aged and the young; the rich and the poor; the learned and the ignorant; the widow and the fatherless the happy and the disconsolate hoping that it may be, under Providence, the means of fixing the wandering thoughts of mortal man upon immortal objects, of cherishing in the pious mind the love of christian virtue, and of drawing from God's holy heavens the gift of strength, charity and submission. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.